Diary for Harry and Judy's RV Trip


Day 25-April 14, 2018-To Tonopah, NV

2018-04-14

Day 25-April 14, 2018-To Tonopah, NV

Drove 153 miles (including a 20 mile round-trip “Oops! We forgot something” trip in 4 hours.

Temp started at 82 in Furnace Creek, down to 59 in Tonopah at over 6500’

We’ve put on almost 300 miles in Death Valley and it’s time to continue on our way.  We got 10 miles down the road and Harry remembered he left a water pressure regulator on the water spigot at the site.  Route 190, the main road in Death Valley is a one lane each way road with no shoulder and rocky flats and wilderness on either side.  It also doesn’t have any side roads to turn around so we were fortunate to be a mile from our turn on Daylight Pass Rd. to go into Nevada when we had to turn around.  Daylight Pass Rd. is the road that was just paved last week and it was easy to spot zebra lizards, which are mostly white, scampering across the road in front of us.  Beatty, NV is about 30 miles down the road.  We were greeted by two wild burros munching on the side of the road.  We filled up on fuel where the price is semi-reasonable at $3.09.  We’re now on route 95 and we’re not seeing so many mesquite trees and bushes on the roadsides, just sage brush and some Joshua trees as we get up in elevation.  Quite a few wild burros grazing on the side of the road and one rolling in the dust.  We stopped for lunch in Goldfield in a parking lot behind the fire dept.  Getting chillier now, 6097’ and 61 degrees.  Goldfield is one of the historic towns that has seen better days.  Still going north we got to Tonopah, NV about 2:30 and found a grocery store, the first we’ve seen since Las Vegas. Services are hard to find on this road and groceries, gas, etc. are expensive because they can be.  Refilled the larder and looked into the campground behind the grocery/hotel/casino. The sites were in a parking lot on a slope with hardly any room between them.  Because they were next to the casino they wanted $27.  I had spoken to another campground up the road that only wanted $12.50 but couldn’t find it in the GPS.  Had to call for directions and, even then, it was hard to find.  A little prairie dog watched us set up from behind a storage shed.  We’ll only be here one night so we just plugged in the electric.  We’re close to the laundry so we threw in a load, then read for a while.  It’s beautiful and warm in the sun but the owner said his dog’s water bowl froze 2 nights ago.  Hopefully, it won’t be that cold tonight.